Description

Based on the 2nd Edition of Advanced Dungeons & Dragons (AD&D) Spelljammer rulebook, Spelljammer: Pirates of Realmspace leads the player into a fantasy world to a pilot a ship (spelljammer) that may travel into Realmspace and visit eight worlds of inner and outer planets for exploration and trade.

In this game, the player captains a spelljammer ship, consisting of several crew members and officers (which may be equipped with items) as well as the player's main character. Gameplay primarily consists of trading goods between one planet and another as well as completing quests available at each planet.

During the course of space travel (first person perspective), the player while travelling in wildspace, may encounter other spelljammer vessels. If the player determines the vessel is hostile, space combat may commence by attacking (or being attacked) by said vessel. Combat consists of two different areas:

Vessel-To-Vessel combat, where the player can battle other spelljammers with the ship's weapons. These weapons (depending on the spelljammer type) consists of ranged weapons (catapult, ballista); ramming, shearing attacks, and grappling the enemy vessel to board it.

Hand-to-Hand combat, where the player boards or is boarded by an enemy vessel after a successful grappling attempt (top-down perspective)

In hand-to-hand combat, participants are divided into the ship's mates and the ship's crew. The player has complete control of the ship's mates, whereas the artificial intelligence (AI) takes control of the ship's crew. Victory is decided when all of the enemy mates and crew are destroyed.

Achieving victory over an enemy vessel will result in the possibility of the player changing ships, as there are various different spelljammer ships in the game. These spelljammer ships may later be repaired or upgraded with weapons/accessories in any planet port.

Forums

Trivia

Amiga conversion

An Amiga port appeared on SSI price lists from 1992, but it was never released.

Saving the player from himself

If the player tried to steer the spaceship into the sun, the game would warn the player repeatedly and automatically correct the course to something a bit less suicidal. A dedicated navigator, however, could correct the corrections and, eventually, pilot a path to his fiery doom.

(A similar possible death was programmed in allowing persistent players to crash their ships into the inside of the "crystal sphere", a hard shell completely surrounding planetary systems in this fantastic cosmology).